Live data from Hacker News

Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

cwu.org

211–220 of 300 posts

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#211
post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is the right non-divestable if you can waive it? More importantly, how could wikipedia possibly work if contributors retained copyright in any form over their submitted articles and edits?

It seems to be a somewhat murky area of law. In Europe (and, I guess Canada) you can't really have public domain because of moral rights that you can't waive. IANAL but I've talked with IP lawyers about this and they've been sortof "Yes this is often kinda true." So the broad public domain that is generally true of the US government and which individuals can release in the US isn't really true in Europe as I understa…

That's pretty crazy, seems like a ticking time bomb to me. I assume the precise meaning of "moral rights" varies by jurisdiction, but if from the integrity part of the Canadian definition started being broadly applied it would seriously change how things like moderation need to be done. I'm not a lawyer but I wouldn't be comfortable making any kind of modifications to text submitted by a Canadian contributor, even basic stuff like PII redaction. I find the Flight Stop example here pretty chilling https://www.aci-iac.ca/art-books/michael-snow/key-works/flig...

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A "marketplace of ideas" wikipedia is not wikipedia, that's twitter or maybe reddit. More importantly, your theory of copyright being unwaivable without an employee-employer relationship makes the entire internet unworkable. Nothing could accept user input of any kind unless it can be ruled uncopyrightable.

Just link original author, and do notndestroy their work, even copyleft license wikipedia uses demands that!

If editing an article opens you up to copyright lawsuits for "destroying their work", it's completely untenable.

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#214
post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's exactly what a union is: a lobbying group that strives for a better outcome on behalf of its members. "Independence" is not part of their job description. Why wouldn't they talk to politicians, or even publicly support the political parties that are more aligned with their goals? Or do you believe that is a privilege to be reserved only for the rich?

Sure be a lobbying group but without public funding. If your members can't be bothered to pay the cost of the union it can cease to exist.

In other words, yes you do believe that having direct access to politicians is a privilege to be reserved only for the rich.

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#215
post #77
post #56

There is no reason for any employee to not search for unionization. It is your right and it is in your best interest. Good for them.

[flagged]

>Hacker news has a lot of owners, managers and what John Steinbeck called "temporarily embarrassed millionaires" (e.g. future failed startup founders).

This way of thinking is so depressing to read about. If we ignore the strawman argument and just look at what 'point' you're making, you're basically making fun of people for having high aspirations. A bit of a 'look at this guy, he thinks he can run his own business! Dummy' energy.

>I'm sure many of them are reaching for the downvote as they read this.

In a perfect world enough people would have hit flag by now where I wouldn't have had to read this at all.

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#216
post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems to be a somewhat murky area of law. In Europe (and, I guess Canada) you can't really have public domain because of moral rights that you can't waive. IANAL but I've talked with IP lawyers about this and they've been sortof "Yes this is often kinda true." So the broad public domain that is generally true of the US government and which individuals can release in the US isn't really true in Europe as I understa…

That's pretty crazy, seems like a ticking time bomb to me. I assume the precise meaning of "moral rights" varies by jurisdiction, but if from the integrity part of the Canadian definition started being broadly applied it would seriously change how things like moderation need to be done. I'm not a lawyer but I wouldn't be comfortable making any kind of modifications to text submitted by a Canadian contributor, even ba…

As I say, a murky area. The MIT license was basically created because the X-Windows folks wanted to release it into the public domain but IBM would have nothing to do with it so the MIT lawyers came up with a permissive license.

https://opensource.com/article/19/4/history-mit-license

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#217
post #56

There is no reason for any employee to not search for unionization. It is your right and it is in your best interest. Good for them.

British have no concept of unionisation and avoid conflict at all cost. Their employer tells them they must go back to five days to the office? They all obediently do it

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#218
post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's pretty crazy, seems like a ticking time bomb to me. I assume the precise meaning of "moral rights" varies by jurisdiction, but if from the integrity part of the Canadian definition started being broadly applied it would seriously change how things like moderation need to be done. I'm not a lawyer but I wouldn't be comfortable making any kind of modifications to text submitted by a Canadian contributor, even ba…

As I say, a murky area. The MIT license was basically created because the X-Windows folks wanted to release it into the public domain but IBM would have nothing to do with it so the MIT lawyers came up with a permissive license. https://opensource.com/article/19/4/history-mit-license

What is “X-Windows”?

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The rising tide lifts all boats. Denying people agency and power in their negotiation by claiming they are "not as good as someone else" is antithetical to the struggle of labor - work deserves to be compensated fairly. >When I worked at a unionized place I was blocked from an opportunity my employer offered me because it was better than what the standard negotiated terms were Your union blocked this because your emp…

The reverse is true. Unionization of the UK car industry in the 1970s, more than played its part in the collapse of the UK car industry, for example: > The company became an infamous example of the industrial turmoil that plagued the United Kingdom in the 1970s. Action by unions frequently crippled BL manufacturing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Leyland#1975%E2%80%931... 'work deserves to be compensated fairl…

Unionisation didn't bring down British Leyland, the management did. There was no upward mobility from the unionised shop floor up to the management and design departments and it led to designs and management strategies that were completely divorced from both the realities of building cars and what consumers wanted to buy. The unions were a convenient scapegoat for Margaret Thatcher, but the reality is that Ford of Britain, Vauxhall, Nissan UK, Honda of the UK, and Toyota UK workers were all part of the same union but they didn't have relentless industrial disputes because they were managed effectively by people with actual experience in car production.

British Leyland were extremely reluctant to produce clean-sheet designs as well to save on R&D, which hampered their production capacity because production techniques were moving on from things that were complicated to assemble and maintain towards simpler assemblies which took fewer manual operations to put together. The Morris Ital and Austin Metro launched in 1980 fitted with an engine designed by Austin Motors in 1951 with the Ital inheriting a crudely widened (with deleterious effects on the handling) and very anachronistic front suspension assembly designed during World War 2 by Alec Issigonis debuting in 1948 on the Morris Minor while Vauxhall and Ford were selling cars with McPherson struts in the front and a twist beam in the back like you'd see in a modern car. The shop floor workers saw the problems, but they had no agency to correct them. The industrial disputes were a symptom of deeper rot.

Re: Wikipedia Workers to Seek Union Recognition

#220
post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

>Hacker news has a lot of owners, managers and what John Steinbeck called "temporarily embarrassed millionaires" (e.g. future failed startup founders). This way of thinking is so depressing to read about. If we ignore the strawman argument and just look at what 'point' you're making, you're basically making fun of people for having high aspirations. A bit of a 'look at this guy, he thinks he can run his own business!…

>you're basically making fun of people for having high aspirations.

I'm recognizing that some people have aspirations to become CEO and own a company and thus represent those interests in a class war, instead of their real interests as a laborer.

As it happens startup founders have more in common with labor than they do with capital. It's pretty routine for them to be screwed out of the wealth they created by investors and control over the company they created.

It's also routine for 90% of them to fail and for them to return to wage slavery.

Nonetheless it's common for them to take the side of their aspired societal position than their actual one.

>In a perfect world enough people would have hit flag by now

I can tell I hit a sore spot. Am I right in guessing that you aspire to own and run a successful company one day but are not there yet and were triggered enough to hit the flag button?

Post reply on HN